Updated November 11, 2026

DV Lottery 2027 and 2028: entry dates, the registration fee, and the valid passport rule

The opening of the DV-2027 Diversity Visa lottery entry period was deferred. Starting with DV-2027, every entrant must pay a nominal electronic registration fee and upload a JPEG scan of a valid, unexpired passport on Form DS-5501 through the State Department's Electronic Diversity Visa website. The Department of State finalized the registration fee on September 16, 2025, and the valid passport rule took effect on April 10, 2026, for the up to 55,000 diversity visas available each fiscal year. Exact registration dates for each fiscal year's window of at least 30 days are published in the Federal Register and on the State Department's visa portal.

What is the current status of DV-2027 and DV-2028, and what changed?

Two Department of State final rules changed how you enter the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program starting with DV-2027 and continuing for DV-2028 and future years.

First, a final rule published and effective on September 16, 2025 (90 FR 44524) added a nominal electronic registration fee to Item 33 of the Schedule of Fees for Consular Services. Previously, entering the lottery had no charge at submission and only selected applicants paid the Diversity Visa Application fee listed in the State Department's Schedule of Fees. Now every entrant pays the nominal registration fee at registration, and selected applicants who formally apply for a visa still pay the separate application fee.

Second, a final rule published on March 11, 2026 and effective on April 10, 2026 (91 FR 11891) amended 22 CFR 42.33 to require the principal petitioner to enter information from a valid, unexpired passport and upload a scan of the passport's biographic and signature page on Form DS-5501, unless exempt. The State Department deferred the start of DV-2027 registration to give applicants time to get a passport, and declined public requests to postpone the passport rule until DV-2028 in order to prevent bad actors from exploiting entrants for another year.

The rule also updated Form DS-5501 (the Electronic Diversity Visa Entry Form) in three other ways. It replaced the word "gender" with "sex" (offering only male and female options based on biological sex at birth), replaced the word "age" with "date of birth" in program recordkeeping rules, and raised the State Department's estimated time to complete an entry from 30 minutes to 90 minutes.

DV Lottery Entry Rules: Previous Program Years vs. DV-2027 and DV-2028

Dated timeline: from DV lottery entry to immigrant visa

Every Diversity Visa cycle follows a strict sequence from the Federal Register notice to the final day of the fiscal year. Confirm the exact opening and closing dates for the current cycle in the State Department's annual Federal Register notice and on the Electronic Diversity Visa website:

• Step 1: Annual Federal Register notice. Each fiscal year, the Department of State publishes timely notice in the Federal Register and on the State Department's visa portal announcing the designated website address and exact dates of the petition submission period.
• Step 2: Prepare your passport and photos before the window opens. Because the updated DS-5501 takes an estimated 90 minutes, gather your valid, unexpired passport, its JPEG scan, and new digital photos for yourself, your spouse, and all unmarried children under 21 ahead of time.
• Step 3: The registration window (at least 30 days). During the submission period of not less than 30 days each fiscal year, complete Form DS-5501 online on the State Department's Electronic Diversity Visa portal and pay the electronic registration fee through the U.S. Treasury payment portal before completing submission.
• Step 4: Save your confirmation number and passport copy immediately. Upon submitting your DS-5501, you receive a unique confirmation number. Without it, you cannot check whether you were selected, and the Department of State will never replace or provide it later. Keep a scan or photocopy of your registration passport as well.
• Step 5: Randomized computer drawing by region. After the entry period closes, valid petitions are assigned a number in a separate numerical sequence for each of the six geographic regions. A computer program rank-orders the numbers at random for each region and selects a quantity of petitions ("selectees") estimated to use all available diversity visas for the fiscal year.
• Step 6: Apply in regional rank order. Selectees are informed of the steps to apply formally for an immigrant visa (or, if physically present in the United States and eligible, to apply with USCIS to adjust status). Visas are considered in the regional rank order set by the random drawing.
• Step 7: Consular interview and the Diversity Visa Application fee. Selectees who apply formally for a diversity immigrant visa pay the application fee listed in Item 33 of the State Department's Schedule of Fees and attend a consular interview. After you apply, you can track your case using our CEAC status meanings guide.
• Step 8: Hard fiscal year cutoff (September 30 at midnight). The U.S. government fiscal year begins on October 1 of each year and ends on September 30 of the following year (31 U.S.C. 1102). Because the opening of the DV-2027 entry period was deferred while the September 30 cutoff is fixed, selectees have a shorter window to finish processing. Under no circumstances may a consular officer allot a visa number or issue a diversity visa after midnight on that final day.

How the DV lottery registration fee works

Every petitioner who submits a Diversity Visa lottery entry must pay an electronic registration fee at registration, set in Item 33 of the State Department's Schedule of Fees. The Department of State established this fee to cover the operational costs of running the annual lottery, including updating the entry system, storing data, running the randomized computer selection, and conducting security reviews.

Key rules for paying the registration fee:

• Who pays and waivers: Every petitioner submitting Form DS-5501 pays the nominal registration fee at the time of entry, and no waivers are available.
• Where you pay: The fee is collected through the U.S. Treasury's online payment portal via a fee payment page during online registration, before completing submission.
• Accepted payment methods: The U.S. Treasury payment portal accepts payments from U.S.-based bank accounts and internationally accepts credit cards, debit cards, PayPal, and Venmo.
• Separate from the visa application fee: Paying the registration fee only registers your petition. Only selectees who formally apply for a diversity immigrant visa pay the separate Diversity Visa Application fee listed in the State Department's Schedule of Fees.

The valid passport rule, scan specifications, and exemptions

Starting with DV-2027, the principal petitioner must hold a valid, unexpired passport at the time of lottery registration, enter its details on Form DS-5501, and upload a scan of its biographic and signature page. You do not need to submit passports for your derivative spouse or children when entering the lottery, as the passport rule applies only to the petitioner.

Consular adjudicators use the biographic scan to compare your name in your native alphabet with its English transliteration and to verify your place of birth and country of chargeability early in the process. They use the signature page to check authenticity and confirm the passport was issued to you.

Keep a copy of the passport you use to enter. Even if your passport later expires, is renewed, or is lost before your interview, the Department of State advises every entrant to keep a scanned copy or photocopy of the exact passport used at registration. Applicants may be denied a visa if they cannot produce sufficient proof at the interview that the passport number on their entry was their valid passport at the time of registration.

• Required passport fields on DS-5501: The unique serial or issuance number of your valid, unexpired passport, your name as listed on the passport, the country or authority of issuance, and the expiration date.
• Scan file format and size: Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) File Interchange Format (JFIF) only, with a maximum file size of 5 megabytes (MB). Portable Document Format (PDF) files are not accepted.
• Exemption 1: Stateless individuals.
• Exemption 2: Nationals of a Communist-controlled country who are unable to obtain a passport from the government of that Communist-controlled country.
• Exemption 3: Petitioners who are, or expect to be, the beneficiary of an individual waiver approved by the Secretary of Homeland Security and the Secretary of State, determined on a case-by-case basis at the time of interview.

Who is eligible for the Diversity Visa lottery?

Section 201(e) of the Immigration and Nationality Act authorizes up to 55,000 diversity visas each fiscal year, with up to 5,000 of those visas set aside for use under the Nicaraguan Adjustment and Central American Relief Act (NACARA). The State Department projects about 10 million entrants for DV-2027.

By our calculation from Table 1 in the State Department's final rule, in the two non-pandemic program years under the previous passport rule (2022 and 2023), the Department received 7,336,302 entries in 2022 and 9,570,291 entries in 2023, and the 205,946 selectees across those two years (112,103 in 2022 and 93,843 in 2023) yielded 111,875 issued visas and adjustments of status (55,882 in 2022 and 55,993 in 2023), meaning 54.3% of selectees ultimately received a visa.

To compete for a diversity visa, you must meet two core requirements:

1. Native of a low-admission foreign state. You must be a native of a foreign state with historically low rates of immigration to the United States, defined as a country with 50,000 or fewer natives admitted to the United States during the most recent five-year period. Northern Ireland is treated as a separate foreign state. Separate from DV nativity rules, some nationalities face broader entry rules, covered in our US travel ban countries list and our guide to the US visa bond.

2. Education or work experience. You must have either:

• At least a high school education or its equivalent, defined as the successful completion of a 12-year course of elementary and secondary education in the United States or a comparable formal course of elementary and secondary education in another country, OR
• Two years of work experience, within the five years preceding the date of your visa application, in an occupation that requires at least two years of training or experience, as determined by the U.S. Department of Labor's O*Net Online database.

What goes on Form DS-5501, family inclusion rules, and the one-entry limit

No more than one petition may be submitted by, or on behalf of, any person during any single fiscal year. If two or more petitions are submitted for the same person in a single fiscal year, all petitions for that person are void.

Your DS-5501 entry must include your spouse and all of your unmarried children under the age of 21 as of the date of the initial entry, including natural children, legally adopted children, and stepchildren. You must list them even if they do not live with you and do not intend to immigrate with you. The only exceptions are a spouse from whom you are legally separated or divorced, or a spouse or child who is already a U.S. citizen or a U.S. lawful permanent resident.

When you complete Form DS-5501 on the State Department's Electronic Diversity Visa portal, all entries must be typed in the Roman alphabet:

• Your full name, date of birth, and place of birth (city and country).
• Your sex (male or female, matching biological sex at birth, even if that differs from the marker on your foreign passport).
• The country of which you claim to be a native, if different from your country of birth.
• The full names, dates and places of birth, sex, and photographs of your eligible spouse and all unmarried children under 21.
• Your current mailing address and the location of the U.S. consular office nearest to your current residence (or, if in the United States, nearest to your last foreign residence before entry).
• Your valid, unexpired passport details and the JPEG scan of your biographic and signature page, unless exempt.

State Department DV lottery photo requirements

You must upload a digital photograph for yourself, your spouse, and every unmarried child under age 21 listed on your petition. For general visa photo rules, see our guide to US visa photo requirements. Every DV entry photo must meet these specifications:

• Digital source or (50mm x 50mm) scan: A digital image from a digital camera or a scanned print. If scanned, the original photographic print must have been (50mm x 50mm). Exact resolution settings are specified in the annual public notice.
• Format, color, and recency: Must be in color, in JPEG (JFIF) format, and taken no more than six months before petition submission.
• Pose, focus, and head size: The person must face the camera directly, in focus, with the head neither tilted up, down, or to the side, and the head covering about 50% of the photograph area.
• Background: A neutral, light-colored background. Very dark, patterned, or busy backgrounds are not accepted.
• No glasses: No eyeglasses, sunglasses, or other paraphernalia that obstruct the view of the face.
• Head coverings: Acceptable only if worn specifically due to religious beliefs, and may not obscure any portion of the face. Tribal, military, airline, or other non-religious headgear is not accepted.

DV lottery scam warning and our 7-point fraud prevention checklist

In the DV-2025 program year (FY25 DV Program), Department of State fraud prevention experts disqualified over 2.5 million duplicate or fraudulent entries. By contrast, during the FY22 DV Program, when a previous passport requirement was in effect, only 760,079 duplicate entries were disqualified, a 69.6% lower count by our calculation from the final rule.

The State Department has documented how organized fraud rings exploit entrants. In 2012, U.S. Embassy Dhaka reported more than 634,000 entries from a single IP address in Bangladesh, alongside computers holding fake education documents and staged marriage photos. In 2013, a State Department Inspector General report documented fraud rings in Ukraine posing as travel agencies that entered citizens' names without their permission and demanded large extortion payments for the confirmation number, or forced selectees who could not pay into sham marriages. In 2023, a fraud ring in Cambodia used a similar scheme to demand thousands of dollars in ransom from selected applicants.

Use our 7-point checklist to protect your entry:

• 1. Enter only on the State Department's Electronic Diversity Visa portal. Form DS-5501 can only be submitted electronically on the designated Department of State website during the annual entry period.
• 2. Pay only the required government fees (the electronic registration fee at entry via the U.S. Treasury payment portal, and the Diversity Visa Application fee listed in the State Department's Schedule of Fees if selected and applying for a visa).
• 3. Fill out the form yourself or stay in the room. While another person may file a petition at your request, never let a facilitator submit an entry without you watching and keeping the confirmation page.
• 4. Never share your passport scan with unverified agents, who can submit an unauthorized entry and hold your confirmation number for ransom.
• 5. Keep your confirmation number private and backed up, as the Department of State will never replace or send it to you.
• 6. Save a scan or photocopy of your registration passport for the interview.
• 7. Submit only one entry per person per fiscal year, and never agree to a sham marriage.

What the consular officer checks if you are selected

If you are selected in the randomized drawing and your regional rank number becomes current, a consular officer will verify every claim from your DS-5501 entry at your immigrant visa interview. Below are the questions and checks to prepare for:

• "Can I see the passport you used to register for the lottery?" What it checks: That the passport number on your DS-5501 was a valid, unexpired passport issued to you at the time of registration, and that your native-alphabet name matches its English transliteration. Officers also review issue and expiration dates, including limited-duration passports. How to prepare: Bring the valid passport you used on Form DS-5501 (or your saved scan or photocopy if that passport has since expired, been renewed, or been replaced) along with your current valid passport.
• "What is your highest level of education, or what was your occupation over the past five years?" What it checks: Whether you completed a 12-year course of elementary and secondary education (or comparable formal foreign course) or have two years of qualifying work experience within the past five years as determined by the Department of Labor's O*Net Online database. How to prepare: Have your original country-specific high school completion diploma and transcripts ready, or bring employment records from the past five years that match a qualifying occupation in O*Net Online.
• "When did you get married, and are all of your spouse and unmarried children under 21 listed on your entry?" What it checks: The validity and bona fides of your marriage under local requirements, and whether every required spouse and child was included on your initial DS-5501 entry. If fraud or a sham marriage is suspected, officers request further evidence and conduct additional review. How to prepare: Bring your civil marriage certificate (and divorce or legal separation records if applicable), birth certificates for all children, and evidence establishing a genuine marital relationship.
• "Did you submit this entry yourself, and do your biographical details match your DS-5501?" What it checks: Identity, native country chargeability, and consistency between your initial entry and your visa application using facial recognition, biometrics, and application records. How to prepare: Review your DS-5501 confirmation details before the interview so you can confirm your city and country of birth, chargeability country, and family details without discrepancies.

Practice example

Can I see the passport you used when you registered for the Diversity Visa lottery, and did you submit the entry yourself?

A strong, honest answer states clearly whether you completed Form DS-5501 yourself or had someone assist you while you were present, and immediately presents both your current valid passport and proof of the exact passport you used at registration. If the passport you used to enter the lottery has since expired, been renewed, or been lost, hand the officer the printed scan or photocopy of the biographic and signature page that you saved when you submitted your entry, along with any police report or government renewal record linking the old and new passport numbers. Make sure you can point out that your name in your native alphabet, its English transliteration, your city and country of birth, and the passport serial number and expiration date all match what you entered on Form DS-5501. Never guess a detail or hide the fact that a relative or facilitator helped you type the form, as full consistency with your initial entry is required.

The consular officer is verifying that your entry was tied to a real, unexpired passport issued to you at the time of registration and that an unauthorized third-party ring did not submit the petition without your knowledge. Under State Department rules, applicants who cannot produce sufficient proof that the passport number on their entry was their valid passport at registration may be denied a visa.

Related guides

• CEAC status meanings guide
• US travel ban countries list
• US visa bond
• US visa photo requirements

This is interview practice, not legal advice. For questions about your own case, talk to an immigration attorney. Visaful is not affiliated with the U.S. government or the Department of State.